Monday, October 17, 2016

Happy Harvest Monday. Cruise on over to Dave's site, Our Happy Acres for all Harvest Monday posts.
Contrary to popular opinion yes I am still around. Seems like anything that can come does come up. Been busy on other projects which means the garden has suffered. In my last post a month ago I was hoping to get some cabbage in but that didn't happen. I visited the garden this past Friday (and once before on the 26th of June) since last post and things weren't as bad as I thought they would be. Turnips came in strong and the mystery disease on the bell peppers seems to have gone away on most of the plants. Actually got a decent harvest of bell peppers and some turnips that will be cooked this week. Probably freeze the peppers. Let's take a tour.

Updated figures. Pales in comparison to last year.

I did some seed saving on the marigolds Sunday and plan on getting more seeds collected before years' end.

Not real happy to see this Carpenter Bee cruising around but he/she is doing their job all the same.

With the dire situation a lot of the bee population is currently facing, we need to do what we can to enlarge their habitat and garden responsibly. It is against the homeowner's covenants to have bees where we live but I may just do it anyway. I am considering mason bees as well as a hive or two of honey bees.

Marigold Seed Saving

Find the dead- looking ones.

Pull them out like you are deadheading them.

Pull the top off and there are the seeds. I got a lot of them saved into envelopes.

I also have more that are getting ready to bloom.

Pulled a few turnips out for meals this week.

Part of the bell pepper harvest.

As I know everyone is aware, Hurricane Matthew headed up the east coast last weekend and made a turn into North Carolina, our current home state. It started at our house Saturday morning and didn't let up till Sunday afternoon. We live about 120 to 150 miles from the coast so the wind speeds weren't hurricane- force but they were strong enough to topple a lot of trees. We did have a lot, I mean a lot of rain. It washed out a lot of the roads near us and people lost power for 2-5 days. Surprisingly we lost power for only about 5 hours Saturday. Usually we are the first to lose and the last to regain. People east of us towards the coast were dealing with flooding all week last week and are now cleaning up. Not a real fun time for all.